If you only die once
by Rosa Heartlily
Summary: Rinoa has a strange dream that leads her on a lifelong journey to discover a way to cheat fate. A one-shot based on the song 'Something I need' by OneRepublic.


**If we only die once**

 _A/N: This is my 14th fanfic for Final Fantasy 8, and is likely to be my last. It was inspired by the song 'You've got something I need' by OneRepublic. I don't often write for Squall and Rinoa but the song seemed to fit them. I don't own the song, which is the property of OneRepublic, or the characters, locations, creatures etc of FF8, which are the property of SquareEnix._

 _This story begins somewhere before 'Holding on to the Memory' but finishes much later. It probably helps if you've read my other fanfics as this kind of weaves between them._

Rinoa jerked awake and stared into the darkness, the edges of the nightmare bleeding into her mind. There had been tears and flowers and a face in a mirror. But what she remembered most was the overwhelming, suffocating sense of loss, so enormous that even now she feared for her sanity. Beside her, Squall shifted in his sleep and she felt relief wash over her, although why she should feel relief she could not have said.

He frowned and gave a wordless cry, her distress finding its way into his dreams, although sleep dulled the connection. If he had been awake, they might both have spiralled down into the abyss of her feelings. She was both glad and disappointed that he did not wake. If he had woken, she could have clung to him, perhaps dug out the strands of the nightmare from her memory. As it was, he formed a solid point of reference, something for her mind to cling to.

She glanced at the bedside clock and then lay down again. The glowing figures revealed that it was 02:04, outlining her boyfriend's face in their green light. She stared at his features, finding security in their familiarity. He was her lover, her friend, her Knight, and now in some indefinable way, her anchor. Gradually, sleep overcame her again and when she awoke the next morning she had no memory of the dream.

The elections in Timber kept them apart for a fortnight but they agreed to escape for the middle weekend to Fisherman's Horizon. She took the train and dozed for most of the journey. It felt like the first time she'd sat down for more than five minutes all week. Organising the elections had taken up every second of the last seven days but it was all going well. The people of Timber would cast their votes the following Thursday. There were still some who were surprised she had not stood for Mayor herself but she had quite enough going on in her life.

FH was just the same, yet totally different. Now that trains were running through to the Esthar Continent again, shops, homes and businesses were springing up, mostly built on floating rafts that clung to the big blue saucer thing – she never had found out its real name. One of these businesses was a luxury hotel that promised total peace and relaxation for its guests and could only be reached by boat. Squall had not yet arrived, so she checked in and then went to the spa for a massage. It was heavenly.

She drifted back to their room, vaguely aware of Squall drawing nearer to her via a Garden-issue 'copter but too relaxed herself to really take notice of his feelings. They hit her with full force, however, as soon as he reached the hotel. Anger, frustration, exhaustion swept over her, their connection ensuring that she felt everything he did. Unfortunately, his emotions were so strong that none of her own sense of relaxation could filter back. A few minutes later he burst through the door and flung himself on the bed next to her.

"Hyne, what a week!"

She gently eased one of his arms out of his jacket. "Tell me about it."

"First of all, Xu is still banging on about how cruel it is to fight real monsters in the Training Centre. I keep telling her that she needs to submit a paper to the Garden Committee but she's always 'too busy' to write it. Never too busy to bend my ear, though.

"Then Zell and Raijin had a stand up row about the last hotdog in front of the students. Again. Short of docking a month's salary from both of them, I don't know what to do.

"Oh, that's nice..."

The jacket and his t-shirt were now on the floor and she had pulled him into a sitting position so that she could get behind him and work on his shoulders. "Is that everything?"

"Sorry, but no. Selphie is organising some kind of extravaganza in Trabia Garden, even though the place is still only half built, and she wants to run a Garden Festival contest or some such nonsense. Laguna has got wind of it and wants to join in, even though Esthar doesn't even have a bloody Garden, yet!

"And to top it all off, Quistis has taken a week's leave to go and see Almasy."

"How is that a problem?" she asked. "She's an adult, she can take care of herself."

"It's just... him... The thought that he's still part of our lives, however loosely. Sorry, that's just me being generally grumpy and taking it out on Quis. So, how was your week?"

"Busy," she replied, kissing his neck.

He turned slightly so that he could wrap his arms around her, then drew her into his lap. "What would I do without you?" he asked.

As she was about to answer, a flood of memories hit her and she clung to him as she waited for them to subside.

"Rinoa!" he said, his voice sharp with anxiety. "What's the matter?"

"It's a dream... a nightmare... I had a few weeks ago. I'd forgotten about it but... it just came back..."

"What was it? You look terrified!"

She took a shaky breath as she gathered the fragments together. "It was your funeral," she said at length, tears filling her eyes. "I don't know how you... what happened... but you were in a coffin. And I felt so lost, so alone. I kept reaching for you but you weren't there!" Her eyes were fixed on some point on the wall, her awareness somewhere else entirely.

Holding her hands in one of his, he turned her face towards him with the other. "I am here, Rinoa. Right now, I am here."

"Yes, I know. But one day you won't be. But that wasn't even the worst part of the nightmare. I was filled with this sense of loss. It was a crushing weight that slowly took over my whole mind. Then, one day, I looked into a mirror but it wasn't my face looking back. It was... hers..."

"Her? Who?"

"Ultimecia!"

"What do you mean?"

"I... I don't know, Squall. I... I can't explain it any better."

"You think you're like Ultimecia? But it was a dream, Rin. You're nothing like her!"

"I'm nothing like her now, while I have you. But what about when you're... gone? What if you died and I was so overwhelmed by grief that I went mad and turned into her?"

"But she was a completely different Sorceress. She passed her powers to Edea, who passed them to you."

Rinoa frowned, dredging through old memories. "But when she possessed me at Lunar Base it didn't feel like there was someone else in my head, just thoughts that I didn't want."

"Ultimecia used you, Rin. She dragged your body around like a puppet so that you could free her minion, Adel. You weren't in control of your own actions. I was there, remember?"

"But you didn't experience it first hand!"

There was nothing he could say to that, so instead he pulled her close and simply held her.

After their wedding, they finally moved out of Garden and into a little flat overlooking Balamb Harbour that even had its own balcony. They luxuriated in their own space and Squall actually learned to keep regular hours. His weekends became sacrosanct and the direst emergency would be required for him to return to work.

One Monday morning as he was finishing his coffee, Rinoa suddenly said, "I'm thinking of asking Doctor Odine to fix my Bangle so that I can't take it off."

Her husband stared back at her. "Why would you do that?"

"Well, I've been thinking. I nearly took it off on our wedding day so that I could come and find you. If I'd caught up with Seifer before you got back I don't know what I'd have done. There there's that business with Hubal. If I hadn't been able to take the Odine Bangle off, I couldn't have hurt Iris."

"And we'd never have known about Hubal. That situation worked out for the best, Rin."

She looked doubtful. "I suppose... But I still think the world would be safer if I could never use my powers again."

"The only way you'll never be able to use your powers again is if you pass them on to someone else. And whoever that was might not be so responsible as you."

"I could cause the very situation I'm trying to avoid, you mean?"

He nodded. "Plus, don't you have to be near death?"

"I'd forgotten that. But what am I supposed to do? I'm loving our life together so much! And the thought of it ending..."

In an instant, he was kneeling beside her chair, his arms around her. "Can't we just enjoy the time we do have?" he whispered into her hair.

"I... I'm sorry. You're right. I'm spending so much time worrying about the future that I'm not enjoying the present. I'll try harder, I promise."

A few years later, Edea and Cid celebrated their thirtieth wedding anniversary, and the whole gang met up in Deling to celebrate. They all but took over the Galbadia Hotel for three nights, finishing with a banquet in a private room. As happy as it made her to see them still together and still so obviously in love, Rinoa was struck by the difference in their appearance. Cid was now an old man but Edea was still raven-haired and smooth skinned. She mentioned it to Squall when they went to bed.

"This again, Rin? I thought you were over these morbid thoughts?"

"I haven't thought of it for a long time but I can't just forget it. And tonight really brought it home to me. I'm going to talk to Edea about it. She must feel it even more than I do!"

"Fine, whatever you have to do. Now, come here..."

She found an excuse to visit Edea at the Lighthouse when she knew Cid was away. The old orphanage was now a successful hotel and was constantly busy, but there was always a room for any of the couple's 'children'.

The two Sorceresses sat on the beach and watched the tide slowly creep towards them. It was a dull day with a threat of rain in the air and the guests at the hotel had mostly chosen to stay indoors. There was a silence between them that seemed that it might last all day if one of them did not begin a conversation.

"So, what did you want to talk about?" asked Edea at length.

"I wanted to ask you..." Rinoa trailed off, unable to form her thought into suitable words. She took a breath and tried again. "One day you'll be... Cid will... but you won't..." She stared helplessly at her hands as if they could suddenly speak for her.

The older woman smiled kindly and laid a hand on her arm. "You're asking if I've thought much about what I'll do when Cid is no longer here? Well, it is something I've thought about, alone and with him. I'll be lonely but I've been lonely before. At least now I have my children."

Rinoa frowned, dissatisfied with the ease with which she spoke of losing her Knight. "You seem very calm about it," she muttered.

"Well, I've had a long time to get used to the idea. And talking to you isn't the same as talking to Cid, you know? I have never loved anyone like I love him and I will grieve his passing, of course I will. But that will not prevent him passing."

"I suppose..."

"But hearing me talk like this isn't helping you to prepare for the inevitable?"

"The... the inevitable?!" She stared at Edea in horror. "Squall and Cid are people. It's not like losing a pet!" Her anger bubbled beneath the surface, almost taking her breath away. She had never been more grateful for her Odine Bangle.

"I'm sorry... I'd forgotten this was your first time. I've lost so many people over the years... And you're right, they aren't pets. But they do come in and out of our lives – our long, long lives – and one day you find you can't even recall your mother's face properly."

The only answer to this statement was a vehement shake of the dark head beside her. The silence between them stretched again but this time Edea did not break it. Eventually, the younger woman gasped, "How can you bear it?"

"I know you don't want to hear this, but it's the truth nonetheless. You get used to it. Over time, as all the individuals begin to blur into the past, you just get used to it."

"But the bond with the Knight – that is something real, something special. A Knight isn't just another person, is he?"

"I... I don't know. Cid is my first Knight. It seems strange that in all the years I never had one before... But I never needed one before. We met just before I had to run for my life and he came with me. He protected me, supported me, as a Knight should. Now, I don't expect that I shall ever need another."

"What about Hubal? He's still inside the moon. Who's to say if he'll stay there?"

"If I ever need another Knight, or if you do, we'll find them, my dear."

Rinoa gave an impatient sigh. "Look, it isn't just the idea of losing Squall that's got me bent out of shape. It's what might happen afterwards."

"What do you mean?"

"I had this dream where Squall died and I was so filled with rage and grief that I... I became Ultimecia."

"You...? Oh... Yes, yes! That makes sense..."

"What are you saying?" The impatience was replaced by the grip of fear that snatched at her stomach and squeezed hard. "You think I really am Ultimecia?"

"I'm sorry, Rinoa, but yes, I do. The first time we met properly you seemed familiar and I put it down to our encounter when I transferred Ultimecia's powers to you, even though we did not really meet properly on that occasion. But now I see... Ultimecia gave me her powers and I gave them back to her when I gave them to you. That was when I met you for the first time – outside the orphanage."

"What... what am I supposed to do, now? I thought I was just reading too much into a dream but..." Her face crumpled and she burst into tears. Edea's arms were around her in a moment and she sobbed against the fabric of her jacket like a child, completely lost to her grief.

She returned to Balamb reluctantly, afraid to be around Squall while he was alive, terrified of what she would become when he died. There was a note on the fridge held in place by a magnet in the shape of a chocobo. "Got to work late. Don't wait up." Apparently working sensible hours only happened when she was around to remind him to come home.

Throwing down her bag, she turned on her heel and walked straight back out of the flat. She stopped at the nearest bar and spent the night getting seriously hammered. Her life had afforded her few opportunities to get that drunk before and she decided to make the most of this one. When the bar manager asked her to leave she threw a punch at him, missed and landed on the floor in an unladylike heap. A bouncer picked her up unceremoniously and deposited her on the pavement outside.

"Do you you know who I am?" she yelled at him, fiddling with the catch on her Bangle.

The man was as impassive as a mountain. "No, Miss, and I don't want to. Now go home and sleep it off."

As she drew breath to throw some further abuse at him, she suddenly felt a pair of familiar arms wrap around her waist. "Rin... let's go home."

"Yes, Squall, let's," she whispered obediently, then turned to give the bouncer a lurid wink but he had already gone back inside the bar.

She slept late the next morning and awoke to a pounding head and her husband's face gazing at her anxiously. "So, did you speak to Matron?" He was never one for social niceties like, "Good morning, gorgeous," or even "Here's some coffee".

Even a small nod made her head feel as if it was about to fall off. "Coffee..." she murmured pathetically.

"It's next to you," he replied, smiling in spite of himself.

She rolled her eyes to the bedside table and saw the steaming mug. Gingerly, she moved her head and hands in that direction, picked up the drink and took a deep swallow. It was still a bit too hot to drink but the burn helped to clear the fog in her brain.

"Thank you," she said with a grateful smile, her voice a little stronger. "Yes, I saw Edea. And she told me that she thinks I really am Ultimecia. Or that I will become her. I have no idea how to deal with this information! I came home to talk to you about it and you weren't here, so I decided to see whether excessive drinking would help."

"Did it?"

His teasing smile earned him a look that could only be described as scathing.

"Surprisingly, no. But it felt good at the time. How did you turn up in the nick of time before I turned that bouncer into a toad, anyway?"

"I'm your Knight, remember? I could sense something wasn't right with you, so I finished up at work and went to look for you. Well, just followed the bond... or however you describe it."

She nodded and then groaned, holding her free hand against her forehead and taking another long swallow of her coffee. "I think I'm dying."

"It's just a hangover, Rin. Now, what do you want to do today?"

"Don't you have to work?"

He shook his head. "I gave myself the day off. That's one of the perks of being the boss."

They spent the day pottering around the flat doing everyday domestic things; cleaning the bathroom, fixing a wobbly door handle, eating lunch together on the balcony. When they went to bed that night, Rinoa whispered, "Thanks."

"For what?"

"For the best day of my life."

Cid's funeral was a dignified affair but with hints of mischief at the edges, like the man himself. Nobody wore black and the Chapel was decorated with vases filled with wild flowers from the meadow. There were photographs everywhere of tiny, personal moments; Cid trying to shout at Squall and Seifer without bursting out laughing, Cid and Edea watching a sunset, Ellone being walked down the aisle by both Cid and Laguna.

There was sadness, but the service was, at its heart, a celebration of a life well lived. Rinoa found herself laughing more than crying as one person after another came forward and shared a memory of the erstwhile Knight. Last to speak was Edea.

"Dear friends," she began, "we are here to remember an extraordinary man, a man who had a vision and had the determination to see it through. Garden has changed so much over the years, and all of those changes have been for the better, but it was begun by Cid's desire to see the world a safer place.

"Farewell, my Knight."

Rinoa felt her own Knight squeeze her fingers and she turned to him with a smile. But the smile quickly faded as she noticed how much grey there was in his dark hair and remembered her dream of him, lying in a coffin, just as Cid was now. He felt her distress and put an arm around her shoulders, holding her close, but the feeling did not pass.

They did not stay long after the service was over and for the next few months, Rinoa became a virtual recluse, staying out of contact with her friends, spending her days curled up on her bed, consumed by the terror of what she might become.

One day, Squall awoke to find her up and dressed, with a steaming cup of coffee in each hand. "Morning, sleepyhead," she said, handing him one of the cups.

"Hello, yourself. What's put you in such a good mood?"

"I know what we have to do."

"We...?"

"Me and Edea."

"O...K... Am I going to like this?"

"We have to go to Odine and ask him to create a machine that will absorb our Sorceress powers."

The Odine she referred to was not the one who had helped them with Time Compression all those years ago but his son. What woman would allow Odine near enough to her to make such a thing possible, let alone actually produce an offspring, was a mystery to everyone.

"Have you spoken to Edea about this?"

"Not yet. I'm planning to go to see her today. Now, you'd better get a move on or you'll be late for work."

Edea listened patiently to Rinoa's plan before agreeing that it just might work.

It took five years but at last the machine was ready. Of course, there was no way to test it except to carry out the procedure for real and Rinoa had butterflies in her stomach all the way to Odine's laboratory in Esthar. But she had Squall with her and that was all she needed.

Edea was already there, with Seifer. "My last duty as Edea's Knight," he said with a grin.

Rinoa and Squall answered with small smiles of their own. The past was the past and they had accepted him back into the family long ago, but the reference brought up too many memories.

"Let uz get on wiz diz!" exclaimed Odine bustling around them.

Edea and Rinoa looked at each other and nodded. Impulsively, Rinoa drew the older woman into a hug. "See you on the other side," she whispered.

"Come on! Come on! Who iz de first?"

Before Rinoa could speak, Edea stepped forward. "I have lived a long and happy life but I am weary of living, too. If anything goes wrong and I don't make it, that will be fine, and you can try again."

She and Seifer followed Odine into the other room and Rinoa and Squall stood at the window and watched. Edea lay on a hospital bed and two intravenous drips were set up, one containing a swift acting poison, the other its antidote. She was also connected to a machine that monitored her life signs. Behind her head stood Odine's contraption but neither of them could look at it.

"Ready?" asked Odine and Edea nodded. A male nurse released the poison and very quickly, the monitor showed that the Sorceress' heart and brain function had almost ceased. Edea began to move restlessly on the bed; clearly she had something she needed to do.

Odine flicked a switch on his invention and it whirred into life. A purple cloud seemed to rise from Edea's body and then was drawn towards the machine, through a nozzle that looked very much like the business end of a vacuum cleaner. When it was all inside, Odine nodded to the nurse who released the antidote.

A few moments later, Edea was sitting up, clearly weak but able to talk and to demonstrate that she was no longer a Sorceress. She made her way slowly back to the room where the others were waiting, leaning heavily on her Knight's arm. When she reached them, she embraced Rinoa.

"Go ahead, my dear. There is nothing to be afraid of."

The younger woman nodded, then glanced at Squall before walking with him into the other room. She lay down on the bed and felt the sting in each arm as the needles were inserted. Squall stood where she could see him and smiled as much encouragement as he could.

As the poison flowed into her veins, her vision began to blur. Panic clenched around her heart and she struggled against the restraints that held her down, but they were firm. The magic that was so much part of her that she could barely remember a time before it possessed her loosened its hold little by little. She became aware of a humming noise from behind her as Odine's machine was switched on again and the power, which was now searching for a place to go, abandoning her dying body, slowly moved towards it.

A moment later, she felt the antidote kick in and life flowed back through her. The panic eased off and slowly she felt her whole system return to normal. But not quite. There was something missing. The magic, the power, the thing that had felt so much a part of her for so long, was gone. But that was not all.

She reached out blindly for Squall, calling his name. "Rin! I'm right here," he told her, taking her hand in his.

"I... I can't feel you. The bond... it's gone!"

"I know."

"I didn't realise..."

"...but we should have known."

"We should have thought about what it would mean."

"You don't regret it?"

"Oh, no, Squall! Never! Now we can grow old together and die at the right time, the way people are supposed to."

And the former Knight embraced the former Sorceress as though he would never let her go.

 _A/N – if you haven't come across the theory that Rinoa is actually Ultimecia before (where the hell have you been for the last 17 years?!) you can look it up. I'm not really a fan of it myself but it fitted with the story so I went with it._


End file.
